Tribes: Ascend/Patches/v1.0.905.0

Tribes: Ascend Version 1.0.905.0

Tribes: Ascend Patch Notes - Version 1.0.905.0

Major Highlights

With this patch, Tribes Ascend has dropped the "Open Beta" moniker. The game will continue to evolve and improve with regular updates after this patch, but we now have moved to Version 1.0! Progress made by players during the beta period is preserved.
Players who reach at least Level 10 in Beta will earn the "Veteran" Badge with an XP reward upon their first login following the official game launch time (Thursday, April 12, at 2:00 PM US Eastern).
A new CTF map, Raindance, has been added to the Quick Play rotation.
A new gametype, Capture and Hold, has been added with three initial maps (Katabatic, Raindance and Outskirts).
Significant additional functionality has been added under a "SOCIAL" menu. Among the changes:

People that have friended you now appear on your Social menu as "Followers". Followers may be friended reciprocally, or blocked.
You may now send a message to online Friends and Followers. When typing in the chat console, use the format "@playername <message>" to send a message to a specific player. Block a player to avoid receiving messages from them. You can universally block the hud notifications for new messages using the NOTIFICATIONS section under SETTINGS.
A variety of other cleanups and feature enhancements to improve the friend functionality have been implemented.

Players can now test unowned weapons and classes in the Target Practice map under Training. Classes and Weapons will still appear locked on your menu, but if you select them, you can try them.
All gametypes have a warm-up timer lasting 20 seconds after a second player has joined the match.
The HUD now shows the status of player deployables.
An early Sneak Preview of upcoming Custom Server functionality has been included in this release. Additional functionality is expected in future releases. During the Sneak Preview:

Hi-Rez will operate a limited number of Custom Servers that players may join that take advantage of customized game rules. You may browse the list of available Custom Servers from the PLAY menu. Note that this server browser includes only Custom Servers, and not regular public matches accessed through the Play menu. Some servers reserved for competition play or other purposes may only be accessed using a password. Additional servers will be added regularly during the Sneak Preview period to test various Custom Server functionality.
Players will not yet be able to rent and configure their own servers. This functionality will be coming in an upcoming release.

See the video below for a preview of the Raindance map and Custom Servers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9MUht_nYc2Q

Capture and Hold Gametype

Capture and hold the various Control Points. Each Control Point is labeled A, B, C, etc.
A Control Point is captured by touching a Control Point's switch. A successful capture will result in your Tribe's icon hologram switching and the switch's HUD marker will blink blue as it becomes "held."
Once a Control Point is been held for five seconds, the owning team gains a score. Any Control Point defenses, such as Inventory Stations, Repair Stations, Base Turrets, and Radar Sensors also become owned by your team when a point is considered held.
Damaged defenses will return up to half-health when a point is successfully held by a team.
Held Control Points generate a score every 5 seconds.
The team that reaches the goal score wins the match.

Weapon/Balance Items

Increased Doombringer's Heavy Bolt Launcher Projectile speed by roughly 3%.
Added a 6% base increase to energy regeneration for equipping Pathfinder or Sentinel Energy Regeneration Packs. Reduced each upgrade on the packs to +4%. Still the same maximum bonus fully unlocked.
Thrown flags now only bounce once, then slide on second contact with the ground. This helps players predict where a dropped flag will go and allow for easier pickups and team passes.
Increased the distance a player throws a flag.
Fixed an issue in which projectiles would not do damage to game objectives when the firing player had died.
Fixed an issue where friendly players could damage their own objectives (when not in a custom server with friendly fire on).
Fixed an issue where Light Turrets could deal four times the normal amount of damage to Shrikes.

New VGS Commands

VGS commands are now filtered depending on the game mode.
[VFQ]: "I'll retrieve our flag!"
[VUG] (CTF only): "Upgrade our generator!"
[VUS] (CTF only): "Upgrade our sensors!"
[VUT] (CTF only): "Upgrade our base turrets!"
[VSUG] (CTF only): "I'll upgrade our generator."
[VSUS] (CTF only): "I'll upgrade our sensors."
[VSUT] (CTF only): "I'll upgrade our base turrets."
[VA1] (C&H only): "Attack point A!"
[VA2] (C&H only): "Attack point B!"
[VA3] (C&H only): "Attack point C!"
[VA4] (C&H only): "Attack point D!"
[VA5] (C&H only): "Attack point E!"
[VD1] (C&H only): "Defend point A!"
[VD2] (C&H only): "Defend point B!"
[VD3] (C&H only): "Defend point C!"
[VD4] (C&H only): "Defend point D!"
[VD5] (C&H only): "Defend point E!"
[VSA1] (C&H only): "I'll attack point A."
[VSA2] (C&H only): "I'll attack point B."
[VSA3] (C&H only): "I'll attack point C."
[VSA4] (C&H only): "I'll attack point D."
[VSA5] (C&H only): "I'll attack point E."
[VSD1] (C&H only): "I'll defend point A."
[VSD2] (C&H only): "I'll defend point B."
[VSD3] (C&H only): "I'll defend point C."
[VSD4] (C&H only): "I'll defend point D."
[VSD5] (C&H only): "I'll defend point E."

Additional Items

Players who are referred by another player through the friend referral system will now earn the "Pay it Forward" badge when they reach Level 6 (includes an XP reward).
A number of cleanups and fixes have been made to several maps.
Enemy stations no longer draw to the HUD, unless it is spawned from a Supply Drop call-in.
Fixed an issue in which the # of players playing each class would not show correctly on first spawn into a match.
Fixed an issue where the Infiltrator's Jackal was stacking the damage numbers for damaged targets directly on top of each other, making it seem like only one of the projectiles was damaging the target. Now each projectile's damage number on a target is represented.
Fixed an issue where players could interrupt a melee attack or belt throw with a weapon switch using the direct switch keys (i.e., '1', '2', etc.), allowing for an exploit of quick weapon switching.
Fixed an issue where if all the players from a team left an Arena match, during a round transition, the game would not autobalance, leaving the other team stuck in the round transition indefinitely.
The whiteout effect from the Raider's Whiteout Grenade no longer persists when a victim respawns.
Projectiles that can stick to surfaces no longer can stick directly to the flag.
Adjusted the position of the first person flag model (it was facing sideways in first person view).
Fixed a bug in which the game client would crash if you attempted to change your name to a 15-character name.
Shrike now has a horn!
Added announcers to Arena.
Fixed issue where announcer messages would overlap.
Damage fall-off is now applied to Supply Drops.
Fixed an issue where the smoke grenade would not properly stealth a player in certain situations.
Fixed an issue where Jackal rounds were not properly sticking to players.
Fixed an issue where placing a deployable in Training would cause you to lose weapons.
Stealthed friendlies will now have their player model rendered and pulsed for better visibility.
Fixed an issue where fast-switching weapons using the default bind of "1" and "2" would break the zoom effect.
Fixed an issue where fast-switching weapons using the default bind of "1" and "2" would cause the BXT1 to charge even without being scoped.
Fixed an issue where a Supply Drop called in on a friendly would cause them to get stuck.